| The first excerpt represents the element of Air. It speaks of mental influences and the process of thought, and is drawn from The Turn of the Screw by Henry James: and the straightest road out is doubtless to advance.
One evening--with nothing to lead up or to prepare it--
I felt the cold touch of the impression that had breathed
on me the night of my arrival and which, much lighter then,
as I have mentioned, I should probably have made little
of in memory had my subsequent sojourn been less agitated.
I had not gone to bed; I sat reading by a couple of candles.
There was a roomful of old books at Bly--last-century fiction,
some of it, which, to the extent of a distinctly deprecated renown,
but never to so much as that of a stray specimen, had reached
the sequestered home and appealed to the unavowed curiosity
|
The second excerpt represents the element of Fire. It speaks of emotional influences and base passions, and is drawn from Pride and Prejudice by Jane Austen: that, from knowing him better, his disposition was better
understood."
Wickham's alarm now appeared in a heightened complexion and
agitated look; for a few minuted he was silent, till, shaking off
his embarrassment, he turned to her again, and said in the
gentlest of accents:
"You, who so well know my feeling towards Mr. Darcy, will
readily comprehend how sincerely I must rejoice that he is wise
enough to assume even the APPEARANCE of what is right.
His pride, in that direction, may be of service, if not to himself,
to many others, for it must only deter him from such foul
Pride and Prejudice |
| The third excerpt represents the element of Water. It speaks of pure spiritual influences and feelings of love, and is drawn from The $30,000 Bequest and Other Stories by Mark Twain: to ever afterward, never to use it except on the rarest occasions,
and then only when duty commanded. He had been a hard drinker at sea,
but after his conversion he became a firm and outspoken teetotaler,
in order to be an example to the young, and from that time forth he
seldom drank; never, indeed, except when it seemed to him to be a duty--
a condition which sometimes occurred a couple of times a year, but never
as many as five times.
Necessarily, such a man is impressionable, impulsive, emotional.
This one was, and had no gift at hiding his feelings; or if he
had it he took no trouble to exercise it. He carried his soul's
prevailing weather in his face, and when he entered a room
|
The fourth excerpt represents the element of Earth. It speaks of physical influences and the impact of the unseen on the visible world, and is drawn from Rinkitink In Oz by L. Frank Baum: reached a bright place he started to open the bag, but
he observed Bilbil lying asleep upon the grass near by.
So, trembling with the fear of discovery, he ran to
another place, and when he paused he heard Rinkitink
snoring lustily. Again he fled and made his way to the
seashore, where he squatted under a bank and began to
untie the cords that fastened the mouth of the bag. But
now another fear assailed him.
"If the pearls should slip from my hand," he thought,
"and roll into the water, they might be lost to me
forever. I must find some safer place."
Rinkitink In Oz |
